Comments

Revised Common Lectionary Commentary

Clippings:
First Sunday after Christmas - December 29, 2013

Saint Dominiccontemplating the Scriptures

Author's note:Sometimes I have material left over when I edit Comments down to
fit the available space. This page presents notes that landed on the clipping
room floor. Some may be useful to you. While I avoid technical language
in the Comments (or explain special terms), Clippings may have unexplained
jargon from time to time.

A hypertext Glossary of Terms is integrated with Clippings. Simply
click on any highlighted word in the text and a pop-up window will appear
with a definition. Bibliographic references are also integrated in the
same way.

Isaiah 63:7-9

63:1-66:16: This section moves towards the
victory of
Yahweh in a new heaven and a new earth, to be reflected in a new Temple and new
priesthood, but the sombre tones of Chapters
56-59 are maintained. [
NJBC]

63:7-64:11: In the first days of the return,
Haggai spoke his prosaic prophecy, Zechariah his
apocalyptic vision, and this psalmist, his agonizing prayer, which is one of
the jewels of the Bible. [
JBC]

63:7: In Hebrew, this verse begins and ends
with hesed. This word defies translation but is explainable as a dutiful love
springing from a blood bond. [
JBC] Liturgical acts allowed Israelites to participate in God’s remembrance
of great redemptive acts: see Exodus
28:12;
30:11-16; Leviticus
2:3; Numbers
10:8-10. [
NJBC]

63:10: “grieved his holy spirit”:
God is affected by human resistance to the prophets and evangelists. In Acts
7:51, Stephen tells his accusers: “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised
in heart and ears, you are forever opposing the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors
used to do”. [
JBC] “Holy spirit” only occurs outside the New Testament in Psalm
51:11; Wisdom of Solomon
1:5;
9:17. [
NJBC]

63:11-14: While five participles cast this
section as a joyful hymn (see also
40:28;
42:5), that fact only sharpens the sense of frustration. [
NJBC]

63:11-12: For the deliverance of Israel, see
also Exodus
14:9-15:21 (from the Egyptian army). [
NOAB]

63:11: Hebrews
13:20 applies this text to Christ’s resurrection, the only completely satisfying
answer to the question of sorrow and death.

63:11: “Where is the one”: This
question, now at this agonizing moment, lays bare an honest, strong, and humble soul
like Jeremiah’s (in Jeremiah
2:8). [
JBC]

63:11: “brought them up out of the sea”:
This is an allusion to the naming of Moses in Exodus
2:10 and to the chaotic sea, which God defeats in saving Israel: see
51:9-11; Exodus
15:5,
8. [
NJBC]

63:13: “through the depths”: God
safely led them through Sinai to the Promised Land.

63:15: “Look down from heaven”:
Psalm
80:14, another psalm of agony, also asks God to do this. [
NJBC]

63:16: Perhaps this verse contrasts God’s
immortality with the mortality of the patriarchs. [
NOAB]

63:16: “you are our father”: Twice
the psalmist defends his status as an authentic child of God.
64:7 says “There is no one who calls on your name, or attempts to take
hold of you ...”. In Exodus
4:22, God tells Moses to tell the Pharaoh: “Israel is my firstborn son”.
In Hosea
11:1, God says through the prophet: “When Israel was a child, I loved him,
and out of Egypt I called my son.” [
NJBC]

63:16: “though Abraham does not know
us”:
NJBC offers were Abraham not able to recognize us. This is unlike
51:1-2, where the reader is told to “look to Abraham your father”.

64:1-5b: God, please reveal yourself in power
as you did in days of old! For God’s showing of his power in the old days
, see Exodus
19:16-18 (at Sinai); Judges
5:4-5 (the song of Deborah); Habakkuk
3:3-15 (the prophet’s prayer). In the
Torah, humans cannot approach God: see Genesis
11:1-9 (the Tower of Babel); Exodus
33:17-23 (at Mount Sinai). But God comes to them (Exodus
19-20). Mark
1:10 tells of the Spirit descending on Jesus at his baptism. [
NOAB]

64:2: “fire”: In Exodus
19:18, fire is a symbol of God’s wondrous presence but here it is one of
divine anger, as it is in
42:25. [
NJBC]

This is a late communal hymn of praise to the Creator.
Antecedents are the tradition of
hymnody common to Israel and Mesopotamia: see Isaiah
44:23 and Psalm
103:20-22. [
NJBC] This psalm is related to the Benedicite (Song of the Three Children)
in Daniel -3:52-90,
Septuagint translation. [
JBC] (The NRSV presents these verses in the
Apocrypha as Prayer of Azariah
29-68.)

Note the parallels between two sections, vv.
1-5 and
7-13: both sections begin with “Praise the Lord from the heavens/earth”
and end with “Let them praise the name of the Lord”.

Verses 1-2:
103:20 is somewhat similar: “Bless the LORD, O you his angels,
you mighty ones who do his bidding, obedient to his spoken word”. [
NJBC]

Verses 9-10: These verses consist of examples
of
merism: of each pair, one is cultivated and the other is uncultivated. [
NJBC]

Verse 13: “above earth and heaven”:
i.e. above everything. See also Genesis
1:1 (the beginning of the first creation story) and Genesis
2:4 (the second creation story). [
NJBC]

Verse 14: “horn”: This is perhaps
a ram’s horn (Hebrew: shophar). It was used in worship (see 2 Chronicles
15:14) as well as in war (see Joshua
6:4-13, the taking of Jericho). To
CAB, it is God’s special presence and effective purpose for and through
his people: a psalmist writes in
89:17: “For you are the glory of their strength; by your favour our horn
is exalted”. See also
132:17.

Hebrews 2:10-18

Verse 5: “subject ... to angels”:
For the present world being under the dominion of angels, see the
Septuagint translation of Deuteronomy
32:8 and Daniel
10:13. [
NJBC]

Verses 6-8: The quotation is the
Septuagint translation of Psalm
8:4-6. It is also applied to Jesus in 1 Corinthians
15:27 and Ephesians
1:22 (and probably in 1 Peter
3:22.) The use of this psalm by various New Testament authors probably shows
that it belonged to a common early tradition of Old Testament interpretation, possibly
because v. Psalm 8:5 speaks
of “the son of man”; however this is in
synonymous parallelism with “man” in v.
Psalm 8:4. To
Christians, it would have recalled the designation of Jesus as Son of Man.
[
NJBC]

Verse 8: “subjecting all things”:
The author sees all things as already subject to Christ. For the same idea, see Ephesians
1:22; however, in 1 Corinthians
15:25-27, Jesus’ reign has indeed begun, but the subjugation of all things
to him will only be completed at his final triumph. See Hebrews
10:13 for the same idea. [
NJBC]

Verse 9: For the idea that Jesus’ exaltation
is a consequence of his humiliation, see also
12:2 and Philippians
2:6-11. [
NOAB]

Verse 9: “by the grace of God”:
A few manuscripts have apart from God, meaning that in death he was abandoned
by God. A scholar suggests that these manuscripts may be right, on the grounds that
this is the more difficult reading. [
NJBC]

Verse 10: “for whom and through whom
all things exist”: The concept that all things God has made find their purpose
in him is also found in 1 Corinthians
8:6 and Romans
11:36. [
NJBC]

Verse 10: “make ... perfect”:
This notion is characteristic of this letter: see also
5:9;
7:19,
28;
9:9;
10:1,
14;
11:40;
12:23. (
5:9 and
7:28 also have to do with Jesus’ being made perfect.) The Greek word,
teleioo, is used in the
Septuagint translation of priestly consecration, translating the Hebrew phrase
to fill [the hands]: see Exodus
29:9,
29,
33,
35; Leviticus
16:32;
21:10; Numbers
3:3. For the corresponding noun, see Leviticus
8:33. This cultic notion of perfection is certainly present in Hebrews. But Jesus’
priestly consecration involved his obedience learned through suffering (see
Hebrews
5:8-10) and his being perfected means also that through that obedience
he was brought to the full moral perfection of his humanity. [
NOAB] [
NJBC]

Verse 10: “pioneer”: The Greek
word is also translated as “Author” (in Acts
3:15) and “Leader” (in Acts
5:31). The designation of Jesus as leader announces an important theme in Hebrews:
the journey of the people of God to the place of rest (
Hebrews see
4:11), the heavenly sanctuary, in the footsteps of Jesus, their “forerunner”
(Hebrews see
6:20). [
NOAB]

Verse 11: “those who are sanctified”:
i.e. ceremonially cleansed and perfected through Christ’s blood: see
10:10,
29. By this means we have access to God. [
NOAB]

Verse 12: The quotation is Psalm
22:22. This psalm, a lament by an individual, was widely applied, in the early
Church, to Christ in his passion: see Matthew
27:43,
46; Mark
15:34; John
19:24. The author of Hebrews places the sufferer’s joyous praise of God
on the lips of Jesus. [
NJBC]

Verse 13: The quotations are from Isaiah
8:17 and
8:18. If C. H. Dodd is correct in thinking that the author of Hebrews also considers
the original context of his quotations, he (as did Isaiah) states his confidence
in the truth of prophecies many had rejected. [
NJBC]

Verse 14: “flesh and blood”: For
flesh contrasted with the spirit of God, see also Psalms
56:4;
78:39; Isaiah
31:3; 2 Chronicles
32:8. “Flesh and blood” meaning human beings does not occur
in the Old Testament proper; however it is found in Sirach
14:18 and
17:31. In the New Testament, see also Matthew
16:17; Galatians
1:16 (NRSV: “human being”); Ephesians
6:12. [
NJBC]

Verse 14: “so that through death ...”:
Hellenistic Judaism held that death was no part of God’s plan for humans
and that it was brought into the world by the devil: see Wisdom of Solomon
1:12-13;
2:23-24. The connection between sin and death was broken by Christ when he, through
his high-priestly work, removed sin: see Romans
8:3. [
NJBC]

Verse 15: "fear”: The fear here is that
death severs one’s relationship with God (see Isaiah
38:18 and Psalm
115:17-18) and also that death, being connected with sin, is more than a physical
evil; in 1 Corinthians
15:26, death is the “last enemy” to be destroyed by Christ. This
Jesus realized: by his death, the way of unending life with God was opened up to
all who obey him. [
JBC]

Verse 16: “help”: The “descendants
of Abraham” are believers in Christ.
NJBC points out that the Greek word translated “help” really means
take hold of – in order to help, so suggests that the author is thinking
of the Incarnation. The verb is in the present tense, so this action is continuing.
See also
8:9: “took them by the hand”.

Verse 17: “merciful and faithful”:
That the high priest be merciful is found in the Bible only in Hebrews; that he be
faithful is part of the high-priestly tradition: see 1 Samuel
2:35. The author probably bases the use of “merciful” on what he
sees Jesus as having been during his earthly ministry. For faithfulness as a priestly
quality in Hebrews, see also
3:2,
6. That he be gentle (sympathetic) is found in
5:2-3. [
NOAB]

Verse 17: “to make a sacrifice of atonement”:
Continually is implied. [
NOAB]

Verse 17: “the sins of the people”:
The sins bring death and the fear of it to God’s people. This is a work of
the devil: see vv.
14-15. [
NOAB]

Verse 18: “tested”: Tempted
is another translation. In the gospels, Jesus is tempted to abandon his mission;
the readers of this book are tempted to apostasy, infidelity. [
NJBC]

Matthew 2:13-23

Verse 13: Jesus begins to meet opposition
as soon as he is born. He will meet opposition throughout his life. If the flight
to Egypt occurred much before Herod died in 4 BC, this verse would place Jesus’
birth many months or even a few years earlier. [
BlkMt]

Verse 15: The quotation is Hosea
11:1. In Exodus
4:22, God tells Moses to inform Pharaoh that “Israel is my firstborn son”.
[
NOAB] Matthew sees in the Hosea verse a divine action which points forward to
the calling of Jesus out of Egypt. The quotation agrees with the Hebrew rather than
with the
Septuagint; either he translated directly from the Hebrew or he used a Greek
translation other than the Septuagint. [
BlkMt]

Verse 16: “Herod”: i.e. Herod
the Great. He was vassal king under the Roman emperor 37-4 BC.

Verse 16: “wise men”: Members
of a caste of wise men, variously associated with the interpretation of dreams, Zoroastrianism,
astrology and magic. They may have been from Persia, East Syria or Arabia. They were
the scientists of their day.

Verse 16: “Herod ... killed”:
In Egypt, Pharaoh had ordered the killing of all male offspring (see Exodus
1:16) – a classical example of genocidal misuse of power.
NJBC suggests that the number of children killed in the Bethlehem area was probably
twenty or fewer.

Verse 16: “two years old or under”:
This implies that Jesus had been born some months before, but no two years before;
Herod leaves a margin of error. His character is accurately depicted here: he even
killed members of his own family. [
BlkMt]

Verse 18: “Ramah”: Some 9 km (6
miles) north of Jerusalem. This town is the scene of national grief inflicted by
an enemy in Jeremiah
40:1: “The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD after
Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard had let him go from Ramah, when he took him
bound in fetters along with all the captives of Jerusalem and Judah who were being
exiled to Babylon”. [
NOAB] Ramah is on the road a conqueror would take in leading captives from Jerusalem
to Babylon: see 1 Samuel
10:2. [
BlkMt]

Verse 18: “Rachel”: She was Jacob’s
wife, and died in childbirth. Per Genesis
35:16-20, she was buried near Jerusalem. In Genesis, Rachel grieves not because
her son dies but because she dies in giving birth to him. Perhaps Matthew wishes
to associate Jesus with Jeremiah – as the suffering prophet of the New Testament:
see Jeremiah
31:31-34 and Matthew
26:28. In the first century AD, Jeremiah lived on in end-time hopes: see 2 Maccabees
2:1-12;
15:13-16. [
NOAB] [
NJBC]

Verse 20: This verse is like Exodus
4:19, in which God sends Moses back to lead his people out of bondage. [
NJBC]

Verse 22: “Archelaus”: He was
Herod the Great’s son, and was almost as cruel as his father. Another son,
Herod Antipas, governed “Galilee”. Archelaus was deposed in 6 AD, and
exiled. [
NOAB]

Verse 23: “‘He will be called
a Nazorean.’”: There are two possibilities besides the one mentioned
in Comments:

∙In view of the preceding verses,
that the reference is to Nazareth – an insignificant town not mentioned in
the Old Testament

∙That Jesus is likened to a
Nazirite, a person consecrated (dedicated) to God upon their own vow or a parent’s
vow. 1 Samuel
1:11 strongly suggests that Samuel was a Nazirite. Samson is explicitly named
as one: see Judges
13:5,
7. Joseph is called a nazir in Genesis
49:26 (“set apart” in the NRSV) and Deuteronomy
33:16 (“prince” in the NRSV). Both Samuel and Samson were consecrated
by vows uttered when they were still in their mothers’ wombs. Perhaps Jesus
should be viewed as a Nazirite in the sense of being consecrated to God from the
womb. [
HBD]

The three interpretations are not mutually exclusive:
Matthew may have intended all three.

Comments: Sepphoris: This town was
sacked in 4 BC. While tetrarch of Galilee, Herod Antipas rebuilt the city and resided
there until he made Tiberias his capital. [
HBD]